Ethnic Concentration
Regional Migration
Early Regional Migration Programs
Recent Policies and Programmes to Influence Where Migrants
Settle
Commonwealth/State Mechanisms
Current Schemes
Effectiveness of Current Schemes/South Australia as a Case
Study
Government Involvement in Migrant Settlement in North America
Policy Instruments Available to Governments to Influence
Settlement
An Alternative Approach

Australia is the fourth least densely settled country in the
world. Moreover, it has a highly concentrated pattern of settlement
with 83 per cent of the population living within 50 km of the coast
and 62.7 per cent living in cities with 100 000 or more
residents.

The broad pattern of distribution has been constant for more
than a century but within some areas significant changes are
occurring in distribution:

there is a northward drift of the population to southeast
Queensland with that state increasing its share of the population
from 14.9 to 18.2 per cent since 1971.

there was a decline from 74.5 to 69.5 per cent in the share of
the population in the southeastern states.

there is a growing dichotomisation occurring between
non-metropolitan areas in the coastal areas of the east and
southwest which are growing in population and the bulk of the dry
farming and rangeland areas which are experiencing population
decline.

Immigration contributes to changes in the distribution of the
population since migrants do not settle in Australia in the same
places as the Australia-born population:

they are disproportionately represented in NSW, Victoria and WA
and under-represented elsewhere.

migrants are especially concentrated in major cities, in
particular Sydney and, to a lesser extent, Melbourne.

Recent arrivals have shown an increasing tendency to
settle in major urban areas since 1986, especially among the
non-English speaking origin groups.

Not only have post-war migrants tended to settle in Australia's
larger urban areas but they have concentrated especially in two
cities-Sydney (1996 population 3.74 million) and Melbourne (1996
population 3.14 million). By 1961 Melbourne had surpassed Sydney as
having the largest overseas-born community in the nation but in the
last two decades Sydney has reasserted itself as the major focus of
immigrant settlement in Australia, so that at the 1996 Census it
had 29.4 per cent of the nation's overseas-born compared with 23.4
per cent in Melbourne.

International migration to Sydney and Melbourne has been
counterbalanced by a net outflow of the Australia-born population
equivalent in size to half the overseas-born flow in Sydney and
almost equal in size to that in Melbourne.

In the early post-war years policies were initiated to settle
migrants in non-metropolitan areas where there was a significant
labour shortage and the programs were initiated to attract people
to fill jobs. In 1947 a quarter of all overseas born persons lived
in rural areas but this was reduced to 7.4 per cent in 1996.

In recent years there have been attempts to attract migrants
away from settling in the areas considered to be experiencing
pressure from population growth-Sydney and environs, Southeast
Queensland and Perth. These are still in their infancy but have met
with only limited success with the main activity being in South
Australia.

The question is raised as to whether the efforts currently
being expended in attracting newly arrived immigrants to areas of
Australia perceived to have population growth which is too low may
be more productively directed at the established Australian
resident population in areas perceived to be experiencing pressures
of population such as diseconomies of scale, environmental
pollution, spiralling land and home costs, congestion, accelerating
overhead costs, etc.

The relative lack of success of schemes in Australia and
elsewhere to encourage migrant settlement in non-metropolitan
centres suggests that the future of Australia's population
distribution is more likely to be shaped indirectly by policies
which encourage (or discourage) economic development outside core
regions of the country rather than by direct interventions to
influence where new immigrants to Australia settle.

Introduction

Australia is one of the least densely populated
countries (2.3 persons per km2) in the world but it also has one of
the most spatially concentrated populations as Figure 1 indicates.
In 1996 some 83 per cent of the population lived within 50 km of
the coast.

This uneven distribution has long been an issue
of debate in Australia (Rowland 1982, 23-24) and raises a number of
important policy issues in both the closely and sparsely settled
areas. In the former issues of negative environmental impacts,
overcrowding, diseconomies in service provision, etc. abound, while
in the latter questions of economic and social viability and lack
of access to services loom large.

This paper begins by briefly addressing the
question of the extent to which Australia's population distribution
is changing. Changes in population distribution can occur through a
number of demographic processes:

internal migration whereby Australian residents leave some
areas and concentrate in others

international migration whereby arrivals from overseas
concentrate in particular areas and adopt a settlement pattern
different from that of the established population.

All three elements have played a role in
producing varying levels of population growth in different parts of
Australia and subsequently shifts in population distribution. There
are variations in age structure, fertility and mortality between
areas which influence regional population growth although these
effects are less substantial than the other two processes in
shaping population distribution. Certainly internal migration is
having a significant effect in shaping Australia's population
distribution.(1) However, the focus in the present paper is on the
third of these processes-the impact of where overseas immigrants
settle upon national population distribution.

The debate about population and immigration in
Australia has long included supporters of high immigration who have
argued that Australia's empty spaces provide a rationale for higher
immigration levels and that such immigration could provide a
solution to problems of regional decline. However, immigrants have
in fact shown less inclination than the Australia-born to disperse.
The present Government, in conjunction with State government has,
since 1996, put in place a range of measures to encourage migrant
settlement in regional areas. The Labor Party has indicated that
population distribution will be a central feature of its proposed
population policy, and that it is considering further incentives to
encourage the settlement of an expanded migrant intake away from
Australia's major cities. Accordingly the present paper seeks
to:

Australia's population is a strongly
concentrated one as shown in Figure 2 with a strong clustering in
the east coast, southeast and southwest regions. It is interesting
in passing to note that the pre-European population distribution
was much less concentrated as is that of the present day indigenous
population (Figure 3). A feature of this uneven population
distribution is the high degree of concentration in large urban
areas. Australia has adopted 1000 persons as the minimum size of a
settlement to qualify as an urban area and since the 1960s has
adopted a population density based system to define urban areas
(Hugo et al. 1997). The Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS)
divides the nation into the following Sections of
State:

While it is difficult to make comparisons
between censuses because of changing boundaries of urban places and
population centres moving between categories, Table 1 shows the
patterns of population change in each Section of State
category over the 1954-96 period. It will be noted that over the
period up to 1971 there was an increase in the proportion of the
national population living in major urban areas. There was a small
decrease between 1971 and 1976 heralding the 'turnaround' trend or
a sharp reversal of previous patterns of population concentration.
Thereafter, comparisons are made more difficult due to boundary
changes and bracket creep but using 1991 boundaries there has been
at least a stabilisation in the proportion of population living in
cities with 100 000 or more residents. On the other hand, the
proportions living in rural areas substantially declined up to
1971. This was the continuation of a long standing trend. Figure 4
indicates that there was a consistent pattern of decrease in the
proportion of Australians living in rural areas up to 1971 and a
decline in numbers of rural residents in some intercensal periods
up to that year. However, since then there has been a stabilisation
of the rural population at around 14 per cent and an increase in
the numbers of rural dwellers.

Note: Based on the section of state as defined
in the report of the 1981 census. Non-major urban includes
migratory population.

Source: ABS 1976, 1981, 1986, 1991 and 1996
Censuses

The figures in Table 1 give a false impression
of a steady state situation. In fact these national totals mask a
great deal of variation between areas with respect to population
growth. This is evident in Figure 5 which shows population change
at Statistical Local Area (SLA) level in non-metropolitan Australia
between 1991 and 1996. Clearly the turnaround in Australia is a
strongly spatially concentrated phenomenon (Hugo 1996). Population
growth in non-metropolitan areas is concentrated in particular
ecological areas such as:

peri-urban areas surrounding major urban areas in which
commuting is significant

There have also been some changes in the
distribution of population between Australia's states and
territories. Table 2 shows that over the 1976-96 period the
proportion of Australian's living in the southeastern states (NSW,
Victoria, South Australia and Tasmania) has decreased from 74.5 per
cent to 69.5 per cent. On the other hand, Queensland has increased
its share of the national population from 14.9 to 18.2 per cent and
Western Australia from 8.4 to 9.6 per cent. The territories have
experienced a smaller increase in their share of the national
population. Hence there has been a northward, and to a lesser
extent, western shift in the centre of gravity of the Australian
population distribution. Nevertheless, it remains a very spatially
concentrated distribution.

Figures 6 and 7 depict the national distribution
of the Australia-born and overseas-born populations at the time of
the 1996 census and some clear differences are immediately
apparent. The immigrant population is clearly a more concentrated
one. Table 3 shows that Western Australia has the greatest
concentration of migrants in relation to its total population with
27.8 per cent of residents being born overseas compared with
22 per cent in the nation as a whole.

The other part of the nation in which there is a
disproportionate representation was the southeastern quadrant of
the mainland comprising NSW, Victoria and the ACT. For almost the
entire post-war period, South Australia has had more than its share
of immigrants but at the 1996 Census its proportion had fallen
slightly below the national average. Tasmania is the State least
affected by immigrant settlement and the Northern Territory also
has a below average presence of migrants. Most striking, however,
is Queensland which, despite being far and away the most rapidly
growing State over the last two decades, has a significant 'under'
representation of overseas-born people, indicating clearly that the
bulk of that State's rapid growth has been fuelled by interstate,
rather than international net migration gains. Certainly the share
of the overseas-born population in Queensland has increased from
15 per cent in 1986 to 17.4 per cent in 1991 but fell to
16.8 per cent in 1996 but even much of this gain has been due to
internal migration of overseas-born people who had lived for
extended periods in other States (Bell 1992).

On the other hand, NSW and Victoria have been
growing at well below the national average but they have continued
to receive a disproportionate share of immigrants coming to
Australia. This is due partly to Melbourne and Sydney being
important ports of arrival of immigrants and also to many of the
immigrants being chain migrants attracted by, and joining, settlers
from their country of origin who moved into Victoria and New South
Wales in earlier post-Second World War years. In South Australia,
substantial industrial development in the 1950s and 1960s attracted
a disproportionate share of immigrants but economic restructuring
and the decline of Australian manufacturing over the last two
decades has resulted in a much smaller share of immigrants settling
there. It is clear then, that although the employment situation in
the States and Territories is of significance in shaping the
destination of immigrants, the relationship at the State level is
by no means a deterministic one.

States and Territories have not only differed in
the extent to which they have attracted immigrants but there are
also some interesting differences in their 'mix' of birthplace
groups due to historical differences in the timing of them
receiving heavy net migration gains, as well as differences in
policies followed by particular States to attract immigrants of
particular types. These are reflected in Figures 8 and 9 which
show that there is a significant difference in the national
distribution of immigrants from mainly English-speaking (MES)
origin countries and those from mainly non-English-speaking (NES)
origins.

Table 3 also indicates these differences which
can be briefly summarised as follows (Hugo 1986, 1988,
1989-92):

Persons born in the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland
are the largest overseas-born group in each state but have a low
representation in the major immigrant receiving states of New South
Wales and Victoria as well as the two territories. On the other
hand, they account for more than half of all overseas-born persons
in Western Australia, South Australia and Tasmania.

European-born persons make up over half of the overseas-born
population in each state and make up a very substantial proportion
of the overseas-born in the states which have recorded very slow
growth in recent years (South Australia and Tasmania).

Among the NES European groups there is substantial interstate
variation. The Italian-born account for 6.1 per cent of all
Australia's overseas-born population (down from 9.2 per cent in
1981) but their share in the states varies from 9.4 per cent
(Victoria) to 2.1 per cent (Northern Territory). The Italian-born
are most heavily represented in those states taking
disproportionately large shares of immigrants in the 1950s and
1960s-Victoria and South Australia.

Persons born in the former Yugoslavia represent 3.9 per
cent of the total overseas-born and are most heavily concentrated
in Victoria, New South Wales and the ACT. Greek-born persons
account for 5.9 per cent of the overseas-born and almost half
(48.8 per cent) of them live in Victoria. Victoria's overseas-born
have a larger Southern European component than other States and
this clearly differentiates that state's stock of overseas-born
immigrants from others.

The smaller numbers from Northern and Western continental
European countries are more evenly distributed between states and
territories.

Much controversy surrounds the substantial growth of the Asian
population. They expanded their proportion of the overseas-born
from 12.4 per cent in 1981 to 16.5 per cent in 1986, 18.3 per
cent in 1991 and 21.9 per cent in 1996. There is a disproportionate
share of Asians in New South Wales which accounts for 44.2 per
cent of the total Asia-born population compared with 33.2 per
cent of the Australia-born while Victoria also has a
disproportionate concentration (28.0 per cent compared with
24.0 per cent). Western Australia, too, has a greater share of
the nation's Asian population (10.1 per cent) than of the
Australia-born (8.9 per cent). These three states then account
for 82.3 per cent of the nation's Asian-born population but
only two-thirds of the Australia-born. The recency of much Asian
immigration is reflected in the low representation in the states
which have experienced slow economic growth in the last
decade-South Australia (4.4 per cent compared with 8.1 per cent of
the Australia-born) and Tasmania. The low representation in
Queensland (10.0 per cent compared with 20.0 per cent of the
Australia-born), however, cannot be explained in this way.

The Vietnamese-born population (the largest Asian group) make
up only 3.9 per cent of the overseas-born (compared with 1.4 per
cent in 1981) and show a tendency to be disproportionately
concentrated in New South Wales and Victoria.

East Asian, Indo-Chinese and Filipino and Pacific immigrants
are strongly concentrated in New South Wales, and to a lesser
extent, Victoria. On the other hand, South Asians, Indonesians and
Malaysians are more strongly relatively concentrated in Western
Australia.

Among other groups there is less interstate variation except
for the case of New Zealanders who are strongly concentrated in the
states which experienced most rapid economic growth in the
1970s-most notably Queensland and the Northern Territory (McCaskill
1982). The attractiveness of Sydney to New Zealanders has also
resulted in New South Wales having an above average proportion of
trans-Tasman immigrants. Americans are more concentrated in the
Territories and New South Wales, and Africans in Western
Australia.

One of the most distinctive features of post-war
immigration to Australia has been the tendency for migrants to
settle in the nation's largest urban areas. Table 4 shows that over
the 1947-96 period the number of Australia-born persons living in
cities with 100 000 or more inhabitants more than doubled so that
in 1996, 57.7 per cent lived in such centres. On the other hand,
the overseas-born population in the largest urban areas increased
more than six times so that by 1996, 80 per cent of Australia's
overseas-born lived in those cities. Hence the impact of
immigration has been felt more in Australia's major cities than in
the provincial cities or rural areas. Over the 1947-96 period the
proportion of the population in cities with more than 100 000
residents made up by the overseas-born increased from 11.6 per cent
to 29.1 per cent. Moreover, their impact upon the growth of those
cities is under-estimated by these figures since the children born
to overseas-born people after arrival in Australia are included
with the Australia-born.

The proportion of the total national
overseas-born population living in provincial cities declined
slightly from 13.5 to 12.5 per cent over the 1947-96 period.
However, the overseas-born in such cities increased almost fivefold
so that the proportion of residents who were overseas-born
increased from 7.2 to 12.3 per cent. In rural areas there was a
substantial change. In 1947 a quarter of all overseas-born persons
lived in rural areas but this was drastically reduced to 7.4 per
cent by 1996. Nevertheless the proportion of rural residents who
were overseas-born increased from 7.6 per cent to 12.1 per cent.
Hence although the presence of overseas-born has increased in all
three urban-rural sectors, the impact has been greatest in major
urban areas. This contrasts with a great deal of pre-World
War II settlement of NES-origin groups which was strongly
focused upon rural areas (e.g. Borrie 1954). It is interesting
to note, however, that there was no increase in the proportion of
overseas-born living in major urban areas between the 1986 (79.6
per cent) and the 1991 (79.5 per cent) Censuses and it increased
only slightly to 80 per cent in 1996.

The first intercensal period when there was not
an increase in this proportion was 1986-91. This is worth examining
in a little more detail with reference to Table 5. This
indicates that the recent arrivals have shown an
increasing tendency to settle in major urban areas since
1986, especially among the NES origin groups.

On the other hand, among those who are longer
established in Australia there has been stability in the tendency
to settle in major cities. This is consistent with a pattern of
'counter-urbanisation' or decentralisation among the Australia-born
that has been recognised for the last two decades (Hugo 1994) and
suggests that over time there may be some convergence in the
internal migration patterns of the overseas-born toward those of
the Australia-born. Bell (1992) identified increased outmigration
of longstanding overseas-born older people from major urban areas
during the 1981-86 period. It is noticeable in Table 5 that
among the MES-born, deconcentration away from the major cities is
occurring. This supports the idea of longstanding migrants,
especially those from similar backgrounds to the Australia-born,
converging toward the national population in its internal migration
trends.

Not only have post-war migrants tended to settle
in Australia's larger urban areas but they have concentrated
especially in two cities-Sydney (1996 population 3.74 million) and
Melbourne (1996 population 3.14 million). This is reflected in the
fact that while their proportions have more than doubled, Sydney
and Melbourne's share of the nation's foreign-born population has
increased from 46.5 per cent in 1947 to 52.3 per cent in 1991 and
52.8 per cent in 1996. On the other hand, their share of the
Australia-born has fallen from 38.7 to 34.8 and 34.1 per cent.
International migration has been of critical importance in the
post-war growth of Sydney and Melbourne. Table 6 shows that over
the first two post-war decades, more than half of the cities'
growth was attributable to net gains of overseas migrants and that
net gains of people from elsewhere in Australia were minor.

Moreover, it will be noted that the net gain in
Melbourne was larger than in Sydney and indeed that overall growth
in the southern city was greater. If we focus on the 1976-86
period, however, a different pattern is in evidence. Overall growth
is substantially lower than in the first two post-war decades and
natural increase (births minus deaths) is equivalent to almost all
(98.6 per cent) of Melbourne's growth and 72 per cent of that of
Sydney. However, if we disaggregate net migration into its
international and internal components it is apparent that
international migration has maintained a significant role (indeed,
in the case of Sydney, an enhanced one) in the growth of the
cities. This has been counterbalanced by a net outflow of the
Australia-born population equivalent in size to half the
overseas-born flow in Sydney and almost equal in size to that in
Melbourne.

The dominance of Melbourne in the early post-war
decades both in terms of population growth and in receiving
overseas-born settlers had been reversed by 1976-86. The late 1980s
and early 1990s has seen a further interesting development with
Melbourne's overall population growth outpacing that of Sydney.
However, Sydney has retained its dominance of the overseas intake
with a net gain of 123 000 over the 1986-91 period compared
with 46 000 in Melbourne. In 1991-96 the comparative numbers
were 173 000 and 102 000. Table 6 shows that the net
internal migration loss in Sydney, however, has gathered pace while
that in Melbourne has reduced somewhat. This 'switchover function'
(Maher and McKay 1986) of Sydney and Melbourne whereby a net loss
of migrants in exchange with other parts of Australia is more than
counterbalanced by an inflow of overseas migrants is an important
feature of these two cities in the post-war period and part of the
phenomenon of the 'turnaround' in Australia (Hugo 1989). The key
point here is that net international migration gains have directly
accounted for more than half of Sydney and Melbourne's net
population growth over the post-war period, and if their indirect
contribution via the children they have had since settling in
Australia is taken into account, that contribution is closer to two
thirds of net growth.

Figure 10 shows the growth of Sydney's and Melbourne's
population over the post-war period and parts of that growth which
have been made up of the overseas-born. It can be seen that the
overseas-born have grown faster than the total population. In
Melbourne they doubled between 1947 and 1954 and almost doubled
again between 1954 and 1961 while the total population increased
from 1.2 million to 1.9 million. Between 1961 and 1996, the
overseas-born population more than doubled while the total
population increased to 3 million. In Sydney the growth of the
overseas-born over the 1947 and 1961 period was somewhat slower
than in Melbourne with an increase of 133 per cent while the total
population increased by 47 per cent. However, in the 1961-96 period
Sydney's overseas-born population increased by 164 per cent
compared with 106 per cent in Melbourne. Sydney's total population
increased by 71 per cent.

In Figure 10 the growth of the overseas-born
from non-English-speaking countries of origin is especially
striking. In Melbourne there was an almost fivefold increase
between 1947 and 1954, a more than doubling between 1954 and 1966,
and a 96 per cent increase between 1966 and 1996. Again in Sydney
the growth was a little less rapid initially with an increase of
269 per cent between 1947 and 1954, and 149 per cent between 1954
and 1966. However, between 1966 and 1996, the increase of 182 per
cent was almost twice as rapid as that in Melbourne.

Table 7 shows the growth of the overseas-born
population in the two cities between 1947 and 1996. While Sydney
gained huge numbers of immigrants during the long boom period and
saw its overseas-born population more than double between 1947 and
1961, the impact was less than had occurred in Melbourne. The table
shows the significance of this immigration with Melbourne's
overseas-born population trebling between 1947 and 1966, and its
share of the nation's total overseas-born increasing by 10
percentage points to 26.7 per cent. It will be noted that by 1961,
Melbourne had surpassed Sydney as having the largest overseas-born
community in the nation but in the last two decades Sydney has
reasserted itself as the major focus of immigrant settlement in
Australia, so that at the 1996 Census it had 29.4 per cent of the
nation's overseas-born compared with 23.4 per cent in Melbourne.
These fluctuations have been in concert with shifts in the changing
roles of the two cities.

Turning to the shifts in the ethnic structure of
Sydney and Melbourne over the post-war period, Figure 11 shows the
changes in the proportions of the overseas-born population at
various post-war censuses who originated from various regions of
the world. It is clear that the changes have been substantial:

most striking is the consistent pattern of decline in the
proportion from the UK and Ireland over the period

the proportion from Oceania (mainly New Zealand) declined over
the first quarter-century but subsequently increased, especially in
Sydney

the pattern for Southern Europeans is one of a rapid increase
up to 1971 but a subsequent attenuation as the flow of immigrants
from Greece and Italy dried up over the last two decades. The
greater significance of Southern Europeans in Melbourne than Sydney
is also evident

a similar pattern is apparent for migrants from other
Continental European nations for which the trajectory of post-war
migration has tended to follow the Southern Europeans

the spectacular increase of Asian origin immigrants since 1971
is especially apparent in the diagram. The greater significance of
Asian origin settlers in Sydney than Melbourne is also evident

other origin groups have a much smaller representation but a
general pattern of increased significance in the last two
decades.

Overall then the rapid increase in the
overseas-born population in Sydney and Melbourne has been
accompanied by equally striking increase in ethnic diversity among
them. Figure 11 shows the changing ethnic mix of Sydney and
Melbourne in terms of the major origins of migrants but the reality
is much more complex with a myriad of individual nations being
represented by significant communities in the two cities. It is
difficult to depict this diversity adequately here but in 1996
there were 87 separate birthplace groups with more than 1000
representatives in Sydney and there are many other smaller but
viable communities (e.g. see Moser et al. 1993). Recent changes in
the sizes of the largest overseas-born groups are shown in Table
11. It is noticeable first of all that almost all groups have a
stronger representation in Sydney and Melbourne than the
Australia-born, with the only exceptions being the Dutch in Sydney
and New Zealanders and North Americans in Melbourne. There are
quite distinctive differences between Sydney and Melbourne evident
in Table 11. These can be briefly summarised as follows:

the stronger Southern European element in Melbourne is
reflected in the fact that of the four largest overseas-born
groups, three in Melbourne are Southern European (Italian, Greek,
Yugoslav) compared with one in Sydney (Italian)

English-speaking origin groups-UK-Eire, New Zealand, South
Africa, USA and Canada-are relatively more strongly represented in
Sydney than in Melbourne

East Asian origin groups are more strongly represented in
Sydney with groups from China, Philippines and Hong Kong being more
than twice as numerous than in Melbourne. On the other hand, the
representation of people from India and Malaysia is somewhat
greater in Melbourne. The proportion of Vietnamese in the two
cities is in both cases twice that of the Australia-born and the
Vietnamese are the fifth largest overseas-born group in each
city

Lebanese are very strongly concentrated in Sydney with three
out of every four Lebanese Australians living in that city

continental European origin immigrants are more strongly
concentrated in Melbourne than Sydney.

Another important observation from Table 11 is
the substantial change which has occurred during the 1980s. In both
cities the increasing Asian presence is in evidence. In Sydney the
10 largest overseas-born groups in 1981 did not include a single
Asian origin group yet by 1996 the Vietnamese, Chinese, Philippines
and Hong Kong-born were in the 10 largest groups. In Melbourne the
change is not quite as dramatic, reflecting the stronger Asian
influence in Sydney. Nevertheless in Melbourne in 1981 there were
no Asia-born groups in the largest 10 birthplace categories but by
1996 the Vietnamese, Chinese, Indians and Sri Lankans were the
fifth, seventh, eighth and ninth largest groups respectively. It
will be noticed in Table 11 that the Asia-born groups all more than
doubled in numbers in the 1980s in both cities while most of the
European origin groups actually declined as death and return
migration reduced their numbers. Notable exceptions here were
groups born in Poland and what was Yugoslavia. Among the
English-speaking origin groups there was a decline in the
UK-Eire-born but significant increases in New Zealanders, South
Africans and North Americans.

* For overseas-born, excludes visitors and 0-4
year olds. ** Calendar years 1991-95.

Source: ABS Censuses 1981, 1986, 1991 and
1996

So far we have examined the tendency for
immigrants to settle in particular parts of Australia from the
perspective of the entire migrant population. It is important,
however, to point out that recently arrived migrants show a much
greater propensity to concentrate than migrants of long standing.
Part of the process of adjustment of migrants to Australia involves
some dispersion of the population so that its distribution
approaches (but does not reach) that of the Australia-born
population. This is readily apparent in Table 12 which shows that
in 1996 some 88.4 per cent of overseas-born persons who had arrived
in Australia in the five years before the census lived in cities
with 100 000 or more residents compared with only 57.5 per cent of
the Australia-born. Moreover, for those who had been in Australia
5-9 and 10+ years the percentages were 86.3 and 77 per cent.
Furthermore, it will be noted in Table 12 that there has been a
progressive increase in the proportion of overseas-born persons who
had been resident less than five years living in major cities from
82.1 per cent in 1981 to 88.4 per cent in 1996.

It is clear also that newly arrived migrants are
showing a particular preference for Sydney. Table 13 shows that
among overseas migrants who had been in Australia less than five
years at the 1996 census some 37.5 per cent lived in Sydney-almost
twice Sydney's share of the total national population. Some 23 per
cent lived in Melbourne which has 17.5 per cent of the national
population.

Debates about Australia's population
distribution have a long history as do the policies to
'decentralise' the nation's population (e.g. see Neutze 1963).
However, for much of the period since federation, decentralisation
has been 'everyone's policy but nobody's program'. Lip service has
been given to the concept but, with minor exceptions (e.g. during
the early 1970s), there has been little follow up with programs to
implement it. In an era where development of communication systems
has greatly reduced the need for business and people to locate in
major urban areas and decentralisation is occurring in other
Euro-American societies, this issue needs revisiting. The focus of
the present paper, however, is on policies which have been
introduced to influence only one group in the population-the
migrant population.

At present there are two areas of policy
interest relating to the spatial distribution of immigrants in
Australia.

Firstly there has been some concern about the
patterns of spatial concentration of some immigrant groups. While
this has been a recurring theme in Australia recently, the issue of
the development of ethnic enclaves was at the centre of the debate
about modern Asian immigration to Australia initiated by Professor
Geoffrey Blainey in the 1980s. He argued that the development of
Indo-Chinese concentrations in certain suburbs of Australian cities
jeopardised social cohesiveness and harmony in Australia. This view
was opposed by commentators such as Jupp, McRobbie and York (1990)
and more recently in a comprehensive study of Indo-Chinese
households in Brisbane by Viviani, Coughlan and Rowland (1993).
These studies stress the positive roles played by these
concentrations. Much of the debate is around the nature of the
spatial concentration with Viviani, Coughlan and Rowland (1993) and
Jupp (1993) correctly pointing out that even in the suburbs of
highest concentration of Vietnamese (Fairfield, Bankstown and
Canterbury in Sydney and Springvale, Sunshine and Footscray in
Melbourne) they do not make up a majority of the population. This
differentiates them from ghettos in North America and Europe where
particular ethnic groups dominate suburbs. On the other hand,
commentators like Blainey (1993, 1994) and Birrell (1993) point to
the high proportions of the total Indo-Chinese community living in
these suburbs. In fact, both of these positions are correct.

The crucial point is whether or not the patterns
of concentration are operating in the best interests of the
immigrants themselves or Australia more widely. Blainey and Birrell
lean toward the effects being negative. Blainey has said 'It is too
early to judge whether these Indo-Chinese enclaves are in the
interests of Australia or even in the long term interest of the
migrants' (Blainey 1993, p. 45). However, Jupp and Viviani
have presented considerable evidence of positive elements
associated with these concentrations. It is a debate which will
continue and needs to be better informed by more detailed knowledge
of the effects of residential concentration among groups like the
Indo-Chinese on the well-being of the people involved and on the
wider community.

The second issue are efforts to channel recently
arrived migrants to settle in particular areas. This usually
involves some form of decentralisation of newly arriving migrants
away from major cities in order to achieve some goal of encouraging
the growth of peripheral areas or of reducing perceived pressure in
particular destination areas. In the last decade or so discussion
has centred on whether there should be government intervention to
influence where immigrants should settle upon arrival in Australia.
There are some suggestions that the disproportionate concentration
of overseas migrants in Sydney and Melbourne is having negative
environmental and economic consequences (NPC 1992) and as a result
some have suggested that migrants or some migrants should be
diverted away from Sydney and Melbourne upon arrival in Australia.
There have been some attempts to influence where immigrants settle
in Australia during the post-war period (Hugo 1993).

The 2-year bonding system applied to the
settlement of displaced persons (DP) and some other European groups
in the early post-war years (Kunz 1988) which allocated settlers to
areas suffering labour shortages, often in remote non-metropolitan
locations. The most famous example of this was the direction of
substantial numbers of Europeans to the Snowy Mountains Scheme.
However, the group was dispersed to a wide range of areas suffering
labour shortages. These included the development of hydro-electric
schemes in Tasmania, forestry areas in Western Australia (Hugo
1989-92), isolated railway sidings, mining areas and other remote
areas where it was difficult to attract people in the tight labour
market of the early postwar years. Displaced persons were under a
bond for two years to work where they were allocated by the federal
government. At the expiration of the two years the majority moved
out of these non-metropolitan areas to the nation's major cities
(although some stayed in these non-metropolitan locations as was
shown in the 1986 and 1991 Atlas of Australian People
series) (Hugo 1989-92, Hugo and Maher (eds.) 1995-98).

Also in the early post-war years the South
Australian government was active in attracting migrants from the
United Kingdom to settle in the state by offering a package of
incentives (assisted passage provided by the federal government,
housing provided by the South Australia Housing Trust and a
guaranteed job, usually in the rapidly expanding manufacturing
sector of the state). This was highly effective in making that
state a major destination of immigrants from the UK in the 1950s
and 1960s (Hugo 1988).

In both of these cases the policies were
initiated where there was a significant labour shortage and the
programs were initiated to attract people to fill the jobs. This is
somewhat different to the present situation where there are
attempts to:

deflect migrants away from areas of concentration of
overseas-born people because they are seen to contribute to the
difficulties of service provision, costs of housing, increases in
pollution, etc. in these places. In some quarters the increased
financial costs of living in Sydney and to some extent reduced
amenity of the city have been laid at the door of immigrants (e.g.
Birrell 1990, 1991). It has been suggested that immigration is the
direct cause of these negative externalities. In 1995, for example,
the newly elected Premier of NSW called for a reduction of the
immigration intake to reduce the economic, environmental and
infrastructure pressures developing in Sydney (The
Australian, 24 May 1995, p. 10). This brought to the surface a
debate which has continued for many years with other commentators
claiming that the blame for Sydney's difficulties hardly lay with
newly arrived immigrants but more with inadequate planning of urban
development and insufficient spending on infrastructure
(Niewenhuysen 1995)

attract migrants to areas which are lagging with the idea that
the migrants may assist in encouraging the economic growth of the
lagging region, use under-utilised infrastructure, etc. This has
often been the result of lobbying of the Minister of Immigration by
State Premiers. As a result, potential migrants have been given a
bonus of five points if they agree to settle in these areas.

The Department of Immigration and Multicultural
Affairs (DIMA) has been a factor shaping where newly-arrived
migrants settle in the case of refugee and humanitarian migrants.
These persons sometimes arrive not having family connections in
Australia and have been influenced in where they initially settle
by availability of relevant accommodation or other factors. For
example, Blainey (1993, p. 43) reports that in the early years of
the Indo-Chinese migration to Australia the then Department of
Immigration and Ethnic Affairs attempted 'to spread the
Indo-Chinese immigrants around the main cities of Australia, so
that every big city had its share and none had an undue
concentration'. This, however, only applied in the early years of
Indo-Chinese refugee migration to Australia in the late 1970s.

The last three years have seen a much more
concerted effort by DIMA to influence where immigrants settle than
at any time since the Displaced Persons influx. There are
considerable variations between the states and their attitude
toward migration:

New South Wales takes over 40 per cent of new immigrants and is
keen to reduce the intake into Sydney because it is argued that
this places pressure on the city's infrastructure

Victoria attracts a disproportionately large share of the
intake with 25 per cent but the government is keen to attract more
migrants to the state generally and also to Melbourne

Western Australia attracts a disproportionately large share of
migrants with Perth accounting for most

in Queensland the bulk of migrants settle in the heavily
populated southeast corner although as a state its share of the
intake is disproportionately low

South Australia with over 8 per cent of the population attracts
between 4 and 5 per cent of the nation's migrant intake. Its
government has been the leader in pressuring the federal government
to attract a greater share of immigrants to the state

Tasmania has 2.7 per cent of the national population but only
attracts 1 per cent of new immigrants.

In May 1996 the annual meeting involving
Commonwealth, State and Territory Ministers for immigration and
multicultural affairs established a working party on regional
migration which could herald a new era in patterns of migrant
settlement. The working party examined ways in which a higher
proportion of migrants might settle in regional Australia. They
concluded that:

there is a greater capacity to influence the location decisions
of skilled migrants than family migrants since the former are less
influenced by the location of relatives and friends than the
latter

A number of initiatives have been taken to
attract migrants to areas which are currently receiving small
intakes. This applies not only to states and state governments but
regions and regional development organisations. These initiatives
are mostly via a number of new sub-categories of migration entry to
Australia and in general they applied these sub-categories to all
areas of Australia outside three designated areas which are
currently attracting a disproportionate share of incoming migrants
and are shown in Figure 12. These are:

All other areas can take advantage of the
special schemes which include the following:

Regional Linked Category-introduced on 1 November 1996
this allowed for sponsorship of skilled relatives (brothers,
sisters, nephews, nieces, non-dependent children, working age
parents, first cousins and grandchildren) to the designated areas.
The category is not points tested but relies on the sponsor and
applicant meeting certain criteria:

the sponsor must have lived in the designated area for at least
12 months and not been in receipt of a social security benefit for
more than 2 weeks in the previous 12 months

the applicant must have a recognised Australian qualification,
at least functional English if their occupations are on the
Occupations Requiring English (ORE) list and be less than 45 years
old.

Regional Sponsored Migration Scheme (RSMS)-allows
employers in regional Australia to nominate overseas personnel for
permanent entry to Australia where the employer has not been able
to recruit suitable skilled personnel through the local labour
market. The nomination must be for a genuine full-time
vacancy for a two-year contract, be skilled and have Australian
standard wages and conditions. The applicant must have an
Australian recognised qualification, functional English and be aged
less than 45

Regional Established Business in Australia (REBA)-came
into effect on 1 July 1997; allows people temporarily in Australia
who have established a business venture in the designated area to
apply for permanent residence. They must have owned and operated
the business for at least two years, have at least a 10 per cent
holding in the business, have net assets of at least $200 000
of which at least $75 000 must be invested in the business, be
actively involved in the business and meet the pass mark on the
Business Skills Points Test (15 bonus points are available to those
in a designated area)

Bonus Points for Business Skills Applicants-states and
territories can sponsor Business Skills Applicants applying as
Business Owners and they are considered by the Business Skills
Points Test which assesses their record and assets. They receive 15
bonus points if they are sponsored by a designated state.
Sponsorship also attracts other concessions

State/Territory Nominated Independent Scheme
(STNI)-was introduced on 30 October 1997, and enables any
State or Territory to sponsor up to 200 skilled migrants and their
families in the independent skilled category each year. The
states/territories are required to carry out an audit to establish
what skills are in short supply and then select applicants
accordingly

Skill Matching-this scheme was introduced on 1
November 1996, and builds on the fact that there are many skilled
migrants applying under the Independent Migration Category whose
qualifications are assessed as meeting Australian standards but
they fail to meet the pass mark in the points test. Those just
below the cut off (above 95) can fill out a skill matching form and
they are included in the Skill Matching Data Base for selection to
state and territory governments. This can be used then as a
resource for the RSMS. The use of Skill Matching saw a doubling of
the RSMS and STNI migrants. The RSMS doubled from 159 in 1996-97 to
314 in the first eight months of 1997-98.

These initiatives were beginning to have some
effect in the sense that a small number of people took up offers by
1999, most notably in South Australia which has wholeheartedly
embraced the new categories. Despite South Australia's take up of
the new policies the numbers remained small and did not yet have
any significant effect in the overall pattern of migrant settlement
in Australia. On July 1, 1999, a new battery of measures was
initiated in order to encourage greater migration to regional
Australia.

Family Sponsored Migration-before 1 July 1999
applicants for Family Migration to Australia were treated equally
regardless of where their family sponsors lived. This is now
changed with different conditions applying where sponsors are in a
designated area (i.e. everywhere except urban Brisbane, Sunshine
Coast, Gold Coast, Perth, Sydney, Newcastle and Wollongong). Where
sponsors are in these areas a wider range of relatives can apply
for family sponsored migration, namely:

non-dependent child

parent

brother or sister

niece or nephew

grandchild.

Applicants do not have to pass the points test
but must have:

post-secondary education

vocational English or their sponsor/caretaker to pay for
English training

be less than 45 years old.

Skill Matching Visa-was also introduced on 1 July
1999. This applies to people who are in the Skills Matching Data
Base, i.e. those who have obtained a points score of between 90 and
the passmark of 105. States or regions or individual employers can
nominate individuals from the data base and they will then be
automatically considered under the RSMS.

Accordingly, there is now a range of migration
schemes oriented to attracting migrants to regional areas. Whereas
in the past they have been restricted to a small points bonus being
given to the applicants for settling in a designated area the new
schemes offer a more substantial bonus while still ensuring a
relatively highly skilled intake. However, the research indicates
that there are two major factors which shape where a migrant coming
to Australia settles:

the presence of family members and friends

the availability of work.

In fact, many areas of the designated 'regional'
zone for special immigration programmes tend to:

have very small numbers of recent migrants

have depressed economies, high unemployment and limited
economic possibilities.

The Minister described the impacts of the
schemes to attract migrants to regional areas as 'patchy' (DIMA
1999). There is no doubt that the programs introduced in the past
three years will divert some newly arrived migrants to regional
Australia but the numbers are unlikely to be substantial and it
would seem unlikely that there will be a major redistribution
occuring in the main destination areas of migrants. The greatest
impact is likely to come not so much in the demographic effects of
these schemes but in the economic impacts, that is, the extent to
which the new migrants attracted by the scheme contribute to the
economic development of these areas.

It would seem that if these designated areas
wished to attract a greater share of the national population their
efforts to attract people may be more productive if they targeted
not only recently arrived migrants. In fact some residents of
Sydney and other closely settled areas may be more receptive to the
blandishments of the governments of states like South Australia and
Tasmania as regional development authorities for the following
reasons:

they are likely to have more detailed information about the
advantages of particular areas. For example, the recognition of
Adelaide as a place of high quality lifestyle is undoubtedly
greater in Sydney than in Hong Kong

it may be possible to attract small businesses in Sydney by the
undoubted economics of locating in one of the designated areas
given the higher costs of land, housing, labour and other bottom
line costs. In addition, Adelaide has lifestyle advantages which
may attract some owners of small and medium sized enterprises.

It is apparent that the new initiatives are
having some effects although as yet not on a scale to impact on
population growth patterns. For example, 1997-98 saw almost 1700
skilled migrants being processed under the new arrangements, 65 per
cent higher than those of the previous year. South Australia has
led the nation in trialing the state/territory initiatives largely
through its OMIA (Office of Multicultural and Immigration Affairs).
The release of the most recent ABS estimates of population growth
in the States would support the view that the initiatives have had
some effect in South Australia. It will be noted in Table 14 that
the number of migrants settling in South Australia in the 1998
calendar year was larger than at any time in the 1990s. The
numbers, of course, are still relatively small and it will be noted
in the table(2) that the proportion of all migrants arriving in
Australia who settled in South Australia continued to fall.
Nevertheless, it probably does indicate some turnaround in the
fortunes of SA, at least with respect to gain of overseas
immigrants. It will be noted in Table 15 that 1998 represented an
important year for South Australia in that several years of net
migration loss (i.e. where net outmigration was greater than net
gains of international migrants) were replaced by an overall net
migration gain. This was a function not just of increased net
overseas origin gains but a significant fall in net losses due to
interstate migration. Nevertheless, Figure 13 indicates that a
significant change is occurring in South Australian net
migration.

Source: ABS 1986 and Australian Demographic
Statistics Quarterlies, various issues

Where immigrants settle in Australia is a result
of a number of complex forces. These include the differential
levels of human capital of different birthplace groups and cohorts
of migrants, the presence of earlier generations of migrants of the
same origin and economic and social conditions at the time of
arrival. It is yet to be seen if government policy can influence
those patterns.

Of the other traditional immigration countries
only Canada has made significant efforts to influence where
migrants settle. In the United States which had 26.3 million
foreign born residents in 1998, immigrants are highly concentrated
in New York, Los Angeles, Chicago and Miami but there are no
attempts to channel migrants elsewhere in line with an overall
laissez faire settlement policy. Canada, however, has to some
degree attempted to influence where migrants settle. Canada's
levels of migration in recent years have been more substantial than
Australia's(3) and in 1996 the intake was 7.5 per 1000 inhabitants
compared to 3.4 in the USA and 5.1 in Australia (Belanger and Dumas
1998, 84). As is the case in the USA and Australia migration
settlement is strongly concentrated. Over half of the 1996 intake
(53 per cent) settled in the state of Ontario and 23 per cent
settled in British Columbia. There has been considerable interest
in dispersing this settlement among some provinces who currently
perceive that they are not receiving enough migrants.

Quebec represents a special case. Since 1979
Quebec has had authority to select some of its own migrants.
Indeed, it has had almost a separate migration system having its
own immigration selection officers in French speaking countries
seen to be potential origins of migrants to Quebec. The Canadian
government provides $C90 million a year to the province to aid the
integration of migrants. The province has modified selection
criteria and is able to accept French-speaking migrants with lower
point scores than migrants selected for other parts of Canada. The
province is able to control the selection of its independent
migrants as part of the Canada-Quebec accords. Despite this,
however, Quebec received only 13 per cent of Canada's 1998 intake
although it had 24 per cent of Canada's resident population. It is
clear that the condition of the province's labour market has been a
major barrier with recent immigrants' unemployment being twice as
high as among their colleagues in Toronto and Vancouver
(Migrant News, 7th July 1999) and a third of all French
speaking migrants in Quebec arriving between 1991 and 1996 being
unemployed in 1996. This is also attributable to the 'quality' of
the migrants. They were restricted to French-speaking people who
wanted to go to Canada and therefore come from countries like Haiti
without necessary skills, education or qualifications.

Some other Canadian provinces also have
attempted to attract more migrants than they currently are
receiving. The Canadian Government consults with province
governments in finalising each year's migration plan and exerts
influence on potential migrants about their place of settlement in
government recruitment offices outside the country (Dumas and
Belanger 1997, p. 70). They have also tried mechanisms like
offering bonus points to migrants agreeing to settle outside of the
main centres in areas like Manitoba, Nova Scotia and New Brunswick.
However, they have met with little success and Table 16 shows that
there are considerable discrepancies between the proportions of the
national Canadian population in the 12 provinces and the
proportions of the immigrant intake settling in them.

It would appear that the Canadian immigration
officials have less room to move than their Australian counterparts
in lowering the points required to settle in some provinces.
Apparently the cut off level for acceptance for settlement in
Canada is considerably lower than in Australia so that a lowering
of the threshold for admittance in Canada would result in
acceptance of people with little chance of settling easily whereas
in Australia the threshold level is higher and those just below the
line have a good chance of settling successfully.

One aspect of the Canadian system is the
segmentation of the intake in particular provinces with respect to
the categories of migrants. This is evident in Table 17 which shows
that there are big variations between provinces in the relative mix
of family, economic and refugee class migrants.

There are a number of policy instruments
available to governments to attempt to influence settlement
patterns. These need to be considered under two
headings-instruments aimed at influencing where overseas immigrants
settle which is the main focus of the present paper and those
instruments which are directed at encouraging Australian residents
to move. Firstly considering policies and programs which might
influence where immigrants settle, there are two sets of
strategies:

instruments which influence immigrant selection which provide
special considerations for settlers who indicate they will settle
in designated areas

instruments which are directed at assisting immigrants who
settle in the designated areas to adjust to life in the destination
country.

With respect to the first set of instruments it
would seem that Australian immigration regulations have been
modified substantially to allow state and regional governments to
attract potential migrants whose point scores fall below the
threshold for unrestricted settler entry. It remains to be seen how
effective those changes will be but it is unlikely to lead to any
major shift in the destinations of migrants. It is apparent that
there are limits to which the government is prepared to go below
the threshold for automatic entry to provide entry to designated
areas since it is believed that to go too low will result in
accepting people who will have substantial difficulty in adjusting
to the labour market and other aspects of Australian life.

In Canada, Quebec is given special funding to
aid the adjustment of immigrants beyond that provided in other
states. It may be that provision of special arrival services,
especially for example in the case of business migrants, can
attract some migrants. Such activities can be undertaken not only
by DIMA but also state and regional authorities which are wishing
to attract immigrants. This approach was used in the 1950s and
1960s, for example, in South Australia to attract migrants,
especially those from the UK. Migrants settling in the state were
offered house/job packages, especially in large factories such as
General Motors Holden with housing made available through the South
Australian Housing Trust. In the late 1990s such packages are
harder to put together but the principle needs to be noted.

In summary, however, it would seem that any
policy interventions are unlikely to work on their own to make a
substantial change in immigrant settlement patterns. This is
because:

many migrants are strongly influenced in deciding where they
settle by the presence of family and friends and others from their
home country so that they are drawn to cities like Sydney and
Melbourne

economic prosperity is not a guarantee that migrants will be
attracted. Witness, for example, the fact that Queensland has
consistently received a smaller proportion of migrants than it has
of the total population despite being the most rapidly growing
economy of the nation. Nevertheless, it is clear that a depressed
economy makes it extremely difficult to attract migrants.

Given the above it makes it unlikely that states
like Tasmania and South Australia are likely to substantially
increase their migrant intake.

The above raises the larger question as to
whether the efforts currently being expended in attracting newly
arrived immigrants to areas of Australia perceived to have
population growth which is too low may be more productively
directed at the established Australian resident population in areas
perceived to be experiencing pressures of population such as
diseconomies of scale, environmental pollution, spiralling land and
home costs, congestion, accelerating overhead costs, etc. It can be
legitimately questioned that states and regions need to have
population growth if they are to become prosperous but, given that
some areas wish to reverse current net migration losses or increase
net migration gains, it may be more productive to attempt to
attract established Australians from elsewhere than to focus purely
on newly arrived migrants. To take the case of South Australia, for
example, one could make the following argument for adopting this
strategy:

the targets for attracting people to South Australia (e.g. from
the eastern states) are much more likely to have information about
the state than newly arrived migrants. Many will have visited
Adelaide and many may even have originated from South Australia or
have relatives and friends there

the targets are more likely to be aware of the advantages of
living in South Australia in terms of cheaper house and land
prices, lower operating costs for companies, less congestion and
life style advantages in the state

the development of modern transportable information technology
is making it less necessary for businesses to be physically located
in downtown Sydney or Melbourne to interact effectively with others
located in those cities.

Hence a program aimed at attracting particular
groups, especially small and medium scale entrepreneurs from areas
in the eastern states experiencing some stress, may be more
effective in increasing net migration gains if this is considered
necessary than in putting all available efforts and resources into
attracting newly arrived migrants. This is supported by the
experience of contemporary North America and Europe whereby there
has been substantial decentralisation of people and economic
enterprises away from large cities. Most of this decentralisation
has involved established citizens of those countries while newly
arrived migrants tend to settle in a few of the largest cities.

It is interesting to compare changes in
population distribution in Australia and the United States. Figure
14 shows that the period of European occupation of the United
States has seen a substantial westward and, to a lesser extent,
southward shift in the population centroid(4). There was a symbolic
shift between 1970 and 1980 when the centre of population crossed
the Mississippi River. In Australia, however, there have not been
such substantial shifts in the relative population distribution
across the continent. Figure 15 shows the shifts which have
occurred during the twentieth century in the centre of gravity of
the Australian population. It will be noted that there has been
very little change over the bulk of the period since Federation.
There has been a slight movement to the west and north reflecting
the fact that population growth rates in Western Australia and
especially Queensland have been greater than in the south east of
the country in the last two decades. This reflects the pattern of
stability in the population distribution although it must be
explained that it is very much a 'dynamic stability' in that there
are substantial flows of population. Indeed around 40 per cent of
Australians move house each five years and around 17 per cent move
each year (Bell and Hugo forthcoming). However, the bulk of the
movement is compensating so that net redistribution is limited.

This clearly operates at the interstate level.
Table 18 shows that over the present century:

the proportion of the national population living in NSW,
Victoria, Tasmania and South Australia has declined (from 81.8 per
cent to 69.1 per cent)

the proportion in Queensland, Western Australia, the Australian
Capital Territory and the Northern Territory has increased from
18.9 per cent to 29.9 per cent.

Again while there has been redistribution it has
only resulted in a small overall shift in the population
distribution toward the north and west.

* Plane and Rogerson (1994, 31) define this as
follows: 'The population centroid, also called the
mean centre, the mean point, the centre of
gravity, or sometimes simply the centre of
population. Conceptually, if the mythological Atlas were to
hold up the entire area for which a centre is being computed-let's
say the United States-and assuming that people were the only
objects contributing to the weight (and also assuming everyone
weighs the same!), the point where he would have to stand to
balance the country would be the centroid.'

With respect to the future one can comment that
Australia has in general experienced less decentralisation of its
national population away from its major cities of Sydney and
Melbourne and their immediate hinterlands than has occurred in many
other developed countries. This would suggest that there are
elements which could lead to a greater overall change in population
distribution in Australia over the coming decades. These
include:

the development of information technology which means that
people and industry are less tied to location in major urban areas
than in the past

the shift in the economy away from employment in manufacturing
and agriculture to employment in service industries

the increasing cost differential in housing, land and
infrastructure between different parts of Australia

the growing evidence of environmental stress in heavily
populated areas like Sydney.

This may result in locations such as Adelaide
which have been seen as peripheral being more able to compete for
people and companies with larger, more centrally located
cities.

Considering only where immigrants settle it is
difficult to see a major change occurring since migrants will
continue to be attracted to where they have a network of family and
friends and to where it is perceived that economic opportunities
exist. Newbold (1999), however, points out that the settlement
system of the overseas-born is a dynamic one which is 'continuously
restructured in response to changes in economic conditions, the
immigration of earlier arrivals belonging to the same ethnic or
national group or the arrival of new immigrants that reinforce the
existing community. Shifting immigration policies, new information
on alternative locations, employment opportunities, housing,
hostility, racism (real or imagined) and/or cultural effects also
alter the settlement system.' In fact, as Newbold (1999) shows in
the US case, the adjustment of migrants is a segmented process with
each group having a distinctive settlement pattern and different
potential to locate outside the current major centres of
concentration. Accordingly in the United States, centres such as
Seattle and Phoenix which were previously not major migrant
destinations, have become important secondary foci of settlement to
Los Angeles, Chicago, Miami and New York.

This is because the set of factors influencing
the most recent migrants is different from those of the past. Hence
it can be expected that just as Adelaide was able to attract more
than its proportionate share of overseas arrivals in the 1950s and
1960s because it was a dynamic growing economy, should it achieve
such a status again it will again attract a greater share of
migrant arrivals. However, the point is that there needs to be a
change in the context of migration for this to occur. Policy
interventions will certainly result in a small proportion of the
intake being influenced to settle outside the major centres but for
a substantial change to occur it will take, among other things, a
major shift in the distribution of economic opportunities.

Griffith Taylor (1947, 44) writing over half a
century ago contended that Australia's future population
distribution would be one which would see the population
concentrated in the areas settled by 1860 and in many ways he has
been proven correct. Rowland (1982, 33) contends that while the
details of the Australian settlement pattern are changing, there
remains a fundamental pattern along the lines suggested by Griffith
Taylor. While decentralisation has been a recurring theme in the
articulation of policy in Australia (Neutze 1963), there have been
few direct policies which have influenced population distribution.
The future of Australia's population distribution will be shaped
indirectly by policies which encourage (or discourage) economic
development outside of core regions of the country rather than by
direct interventions to influence where new immigrants to Australia
settle.

The high national net migration gain includes a large net gain
of non-permanent migrants (Hugo 1999) and since the bulk of these
are counted in the eastern states this figure probably hides an
increase in the share of permanent settler arrivals settling in
South Australia.

Plane and Rogerson (1994, p. 31) define this as follows: 'The
population centroid, also called the mean centre,
the mean point, the centre of gravity, or
sometimes simply the centre of population. Conceptually,
if the mythological Atlas were to hold up the entire area for which
a centre is being computed-let's say the United States-and assuming
that people were the only objects contributing to the weight (and
also assuming everyone weighs the same!), the point where he would
have to stand to balance the country would be the centroid.'

Hugo, G.J., 1986, 'An Appraisal of the
Rationale, Objectives, Achievements and Future of the Australian
Immigration Points System and an Analysis of its Present and Past
Operations', Report for the Migration Committee (Committee 1) of
the National Population Council, November.